


Neji of the Sound

by SereneSorrow



Category: Naruto
Genre: Clones, M/M, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-18
Updated: 2018-08-30
Packaged: 2019-03-06 07:02:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13405947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SereneSorrow/pseuds/SereneSorrow
Summary: Given a second chance that he never wanted Neji puts aside his own desires and accepts the responsibility of changing the future to save his village and everyone he cares for. Working alone under the burden of future knowledge Neji finds an unorthodox approach to turn an enemy into an ally.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For people who aren't reading any of my other stories: I've challenged myself to post SOMETHING (new work, new series, new chapter) every day, so if I don't just give up on this challenge tomorrow then you'll be seeing a lot of various stories with very short chapters.

     Neji ran beside Shikamaru as the formation fled the last battlefield, the enemy trailing close behind. He urged his lover onward quickly as Kaguya's forces gained on them, but he and Shikamaru didn't have the stamina of the last two former Jinchuriki who had pulled ahead of them. It was Naruto who noticed that he and Gaara were pulling ahead and turned to look. Neji could tell that Shikamaru wouldn't be able to move any faster and Naruto realized it just from a quick glance back as well.

     “Shikamaru!” The knucklehead shouted as he planted his feet and skidded to a stop as Shikamaru's steps caught him up. The Blonde made a fist and angled to engaged with the enemy coming up on them but Shikamaru grabbed the blonde's collar and dragged him onward.

     “No! We can't stop! We don't have a plan. If we stop we won't be able to escape again!” Shikamaru ordered between panted breaths.

     “They're gaining.” Gaara said blandly, “and you can't keep up. They won't tire first.”

     “I can carry you! Shikamaru-” Naruto started, reaching for Shikamaru's arm but the Nara knocked his arm away and interrupted.

     “No! You're chakra capacity may have increased but without the nine-tails you can't run indefinitely. You have to go on. If they catch me I'll hold them off as long as I can.” Shikamaru insisted.

     Neji's heart plummeted as fast as the haunted look entered Naruto's eyes. _Shikamaru couldn't die! Not here! Not now!_ He was their strategist, they'd only lasted as long as it is because of his brilliant mind. When everyone else was gone, all their allies fallen one by one and as far as they knew themselves the last ninjas alive in the world without him they would all be lost, Naruto's determination would not be enough this time.

     “Shikamaru, you can't give up!” Neji pleaded as he watched his lover forcing himself to keep up with the others.

     “Shikamaru we won't leave you behind! I promised Ino! I won't leave my comrades behind!” Naruto declared.

     “Do you have any idea how tired I am of seeing the people I care about die for me? Please, let me buy you some time!” The Nara begged his friend.

     “I don't know how far we can get anyway. They won't tire, and we have nowhere else left to run.” Gaara said pessimistically. He had long since reverted to his old fatalistic outlook. The loss of both of his siblings hadn't been enough. Not with so many people who had come to care for him, so many allies banded together and Naruto to knock him out of his darkness but now, with their team as the last survivors even that wasn't enough.

     Suddenly the ground erupted beneath them, and though they jumped clear Shikamaru's landing was off. His ankle twisted beneath him on the still churning ground and he went down. Neji cried out and rushed to his side.

     Naruto made to join them but Shikamaru's shout of “Go!” was enough for Gaara to grab the Uzumaki and launch them forward despite Naruto's protests.

     Shikamaru started a series of hand signs that Neji was intimately familiar with and Neji knew he must be using the last of his chakra for this Shadow Strangulation Jutsu. He turned to the arriving reanimated soldiers himself and gauged their approach. The shadows exploded outward around them and engulfed the enemy as they landed in range. The capture forced the earth jutsu that had shaken the ground to still beneath their feet. The enemy nin were one and all captured and their glazed stares watched Shikamaru as his arms trembled with the effort of holding the last sign.

     Neji knew that his chakra was depleting rapidly and that he wouldn't last much longer. He also knew that Shikamaru was determined to hold the jutsu for as long as he was able even though it meant he would be too weak to move when the shadows broke. There would be no escaping, and likely no fighting back against the enemy tearing him apart. Neji turned to the nearest enemy even as he saw the shadows themselves begin to tremble and thrust his fist through the corpse. Crying in rage and frustration Neji kept attacking, even as the shadows fell and the enemy snapped into action, not even bothering to cast jutsu of their own as they pulled weapons on Shikamaru despite Neji's furious continued attack. A number of the group even turned away and set off after the two Jinchuriki. Neji was horrified to see Shikamaru overpowered and flashed to his lover's side, but his efforts were in vain and tears poured from his eyes as despite Neji's attempts to protect him he heard the man he loved cry out in pain, blood on his lips as he took his last shuddering breaths against the many steel blades protruding from his nearly crushed chest.

     “Neji.” Another wet cough from Shikamaru's lips but Neji was at his side already. “I'm coming to join you. Finally. We'll” -cough- “be together again. I'm sorry I made you wait.” The words were gasped, whispered, and finally just mouthed through those precious bloody lips and Neji's hands ran over his fading lover's face and shoulders.

     Shikamaru's eyes were dry and dull, he had nothing to cry for, he thought he was finally about to see his lover again. Neji was the one who was devastated all over again. Wherever Shikamaru was going next, wherever all of them went after their deaths, he wasn't there. For whatever cruel trick of fate was at play had trapped Neji in the world of the living as some kind of ghost and cursed him to walk unseen and unheard beside his friends after his own death. He had watched and been unable to interfere as the war continued and the allied shinobi forces had taken loss after loss. He had watched his love crumble from first his own loss and then the burden of being one of the, and then _the_ strategist of the alliance. Having every life lost on a mission he had planned weigh on his heart, mind and soul.

     Nothing Neji had tried had been enough to reach him. Voice, touch, jutsu and chakra manipulation, he couldn't even land a blow on the dead men and women who had just killed Shikamaru. He was indeed a master of the gentle fist, the corpses hadn't even felt it when his fists had passed harmlessly right through their chests leaving no harm done. Neji sobbed again, slumping over the bloody corpse of his lover as Kaguya's pets milled around them.

     Neji wasn't sure how much time passed but eventually the puppets straitened all together and spoke in unison. “It is done. The last three are dead.” Neji realized that this could only mean that Naruto and Gaara hadn't escaped despite Shikamaru's sacrifice. They had been caught and killed. Gaara had been right to be pessimistic, they hadn't had the strength to survive any longer. This was the end of everything. The puppets slumped again, staring blearily at them. Neji kept up the facsimile of an embrace he had on Shikamaru's body while he despaired of what he was supposed to do now, alone but for puppets and the rabbit goddess, _and how much longer would she need the puppets now?_

     Tobirama turned to Shikamaru's body- no, the former Hokage was looking at _him_ \- their eyes meeting as none of the corpse puppets had ever looked at him before and Neji realized with a kind of mute rage that the other dead man could see him. “There is not much time. If you want a second chance there is something we can do.”

    _Could all of them see him? Had they all ignored him on purpose?_ “You've been able to see me all this time? You all have?” Neji demanded shrilly of the ninjas surrounding him.

     “There was no need to acknowledge your presence when you could not effect the outcome of the war against Kaguya's favor.” Itatchi Uchiha stated dully.

     “We do not willingly serve _Her_.” A Sand ninja said.

“A second chance for what?” He asked, setting aside his questions about why the undead men could see him and yet had never spoken to him before.

“For everything. To stop the war and save everyone.” Another unfamiliar ninja said.

     Neji considered them, his hollow eyes dropping down once more to Shikamaru's dead stare. He wanted to go with Shikamaru, he wanted them to be together, and he wanted badly to be free of the Leaf village and his Clan. Neji stopped that train of thought, considering instead what Shikamaru would want to do. The Nara was lazy but he'd always fulfilled his duty, always served his people as well as he could. All of this time he had pushed himself to continue despite his own suffering if only he could help the people who were counting on him. He'd been haunted by everything that he had lost, the homes that were gone and the friends and family that he had grieved for as he outlived nearly everyone in the world. He had kept trying to find a way to fight, to change their fate, to save the people that mattered to him.

     There wasn't really a decision to make here, his choice was already obvious. He could see Shikamaru alive again, he could keep his lover safe this time. No matter what else he felt, that was something he wanted more than anything. Neji would fight to the end for their survival this time, and take the burden of finding a way to stop Kaguya off of Shikamaru's tired shoulders.

     “What do we do?” Neji stood, trying not to glance back at Shikamaru. He had to focus on the future now.

     “With the amount of chakra Kaguya has imbued all of us with I have more power to funnel into my space-time ninjutsu than ever before. We've managed to find a dimension that can connect to the past, for brief moments, but sending any of us back would sever our connection to Kaguya and we would return to being lifeless corpses.” Tobirama explained.

     Alright then. Neji sighed. “Just do it. Whatever it is, just get it over with.” He said with resignation.

     Despite his certainty to follow through with his decision he didn't want to do this, he was torn in two directions between knowing his duty to his village, his Clan, his friends, and just wanting to give up and find peace for his soul at last. Closing his eyes as the corpses shifted around him, making haste to prepare whatever it was that they had come up with, Neji sighed and tried to center himself. He had to stay focused, he couldn't allow his own weak thoughts to hold him back from fulfilling his mission. He would go back in time and find a way to save everyone that he possibly could, he would do anything he had to in order to divert this impossible war.


	2. Chapter 2

Neji woke with a gasp and sat bolt upright in bed. The air in his lungs felt heavy, the effort of drawing breath so constricting that he wasn't sure he could keep doing it. Neji struggled out of the blankets and tumbled onto the floor, hitting the ground and collapsing under his own weight still just trying to breathe. _He couldn't do this, it was impossible! How had he ever been able to do this before?_ His time as a ghost must have gotten him so used to weightlessness and not needing to breathe that his body couldn't remember how.

     Neji forced his body to it's hands and knees on the floor and started trying one of the standard breathing exercises he had been taught before he had even entered the academy. It was no use. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't _breathe_. Collapsing face down Neji drifted off on the last breath of his frozen lungs. _This couldn't happen! This couldn't- there were so many people he had to save... so many people he wanted to see alive again. Was he really going to die here? Would he have to wait now? For everyone he cared about too die so that he could see them again in the next life? Nooooo. He wanted to see them now. Shikamaru... Shikamaru..._

     He was breathing normally. When next he regained consciousness he was still on the floor but besides a kind of tense soreness in his chest Neji felt normal. He pushed himself up shakily and observed the room around him. It was his childhood room in the Hyuuga compound, but there were a lot of things missing. Neji looked down at himself and realized just how short he was. _He was a child! Just how young was he?_

     He had noticed the lightning of the sky outside his window peripherally but it hadn't registered, and so he was unprepared when the door rattled open quietly and his father stepped inside to wake him. As Neji came face to face with this ghost his breath froze again and he fell to his knees. _His father was here! Alive! He had time! How old was he? Five? Four? How much time did he have?_ He didn't notice the tears on his cheeks until he was in his father's arms and the fabric against his face grew damp. Neji gasped in a desperate breath and the scent that flooded in was so unfamiliar that it almost wasn't comforting, but some long lost part of him recognized it and he calmed well enough to keep breathing.

     “Neji? What is it? Did you have a bad dream?” His father's hands caressed the back of his head and rubbed his back as Neji clutched at his shirt.

     “Yes!” Yes. A nightmare. His whole life seemed to have been.

     “It's alright. You're awake now, I'm here.”

     Neji burst into tears again. His father was here. He was really here. Neji wouldn't let him die this time. No matter what he had to do.

***

     Neji followed his father everywhere. Everywhere he was allowed. He even tried to follow sometimes when he wasn't allowed, but never well enough that if he was caught his father would ask were he had learned how to sneak so well, it was a delicate balance and so he was often caught. He knew the date though and that he was almost five years old. He had half a year to figure out how to save his father without changing too much else.

     He hadn't paid much attention, in the future, to what the reanimated ninja's were doing. Tobirama had tried to explain but the exact plan had been left up to Neji once he arrived here. He had never given much of his time to fiction but he knew that there were theories about time travel, and he knew every decision mattered. A single decision could change lives forever, that was a lesson he had learned the first time he was five years old. He had also learned how impossible it was to change one's fate, but he had to try, for his father.

     His father who clearly found Neji's sudden obsessive concern for his father odd. Neji could tell that his father was trying to figure out what was wrong and how to speak with him about it, but he doubted that his father would guess his son from the future was trying to plan how to save his life. Instead his father seemed to think he wanted more attention and was vacillating between pushing Neji to be more independent and allowing Neji to spend more time with him, often having Neji help him with household tasks.

     This had more than one useful side effect. It was amazing really, how much information even a ninja clan would give away in front of a child assuming that they weren't paying enough attention to understand. In fact, he would never have been able to employ the plan he did if it weren't for his refreshed and more detailed understanding of the house. Neji learned what poisons would be noticed right away and which could be missed if the dishes were washed in a timely manner when he helped in the kitchen. He learned the best route to sneak into the Hyuuga compound when he delivered scrolls to various relatives, and he discovered the perfect places to conceal traps even from active byakugan eyes when he assisted in maintaining the trees and gardens that were scattered within the compound.

     All in all, by the time Neji heard about the plans for the Kumogakure delegation's arrival his plan was as ready as it would ever be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhhh. I wanted to add more to this but I felt awful all day, so fixing typo's was all I could manage doing.... :(


	3. Get Interactive!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not a new chapter but please read this author's note. :D

So I AM still working on this story, this isn't really an *On Hiatus* message or anything, but even when I posted these chapters the first time I wasn't entirely satisfied with them, I was hoping that by posting what I had I would be MORE motivated to keep going with it but that hasn't entirely worked out, I do have half of the next chapter, but WRITERS BLOCK! WHYYYYY! and I even came up with almost a page that I wanted to add to last chapter, but I was waiting to do so for the next update...

SO! Overall, I never had a real outline for this story, just a LOT of ideas scattered all over the place and out of order, so I'm going to be working on a real (and hopefully SUPER detailed) outline, and then I'm going to try to rewrite what I already have written.

The reason for telling you all this is that with one of my other stories (Baby White Fang) I got a lot of really helpful responses when I asked for suggestions of things like family interaction to write about, which have really helped me organize what I have so far of that story's outline, so I thought that I would do something similar here for Neji of the Sound.

One of the biggest problems I'm having with this story is describing the Hyuuga clan and their home life, I just can't seem to picture what little 5 year old Neji would be doing day to day, nor how the rest of his clan would be interacting with him way back when he was 'just another kid' not famous or pitiable or angry, so if any readers have any ideas/requests for how Neji gets along with his clan I'd love to hear from you, and having more time now I'm planning to start responding to comments more often so hopefully you'll get replies. :D


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